Refocusing Board fundraisiNG through self-Assessment
One of the most common challenges that arises in conversation among my fellow development professionals and senior organizational leaders is the lack of clarity between boards of directors and staff in regard to board fundraising expectations. Having been both a development professional and a board member, I can attest to the fact that expectations on both sides can often be murky, misaligned and veer surprisingly far from general best practices. If left unresolved, this lack of clarity can become a major obstacle and drain momentum from board fundraising engagement.
An important first step toward gaining clarity around expectations and determining where needs, concerns and knowledge deficits may exist is the act of board self-assessment. Not only is ongoing self-assessment critical for boards that wish to continually learn, grow and improve their ability to govern an organization, it can also help boards that have become disparate and disorganized to reconnect with their purpose. There are many resources available online to help staff and board members create general self-assessments, as well as self-assessments focused on specific areas, like fund development. You can click here for a link to an example of a simple board self-assessment survey that is focused on fund development, with questions that relate to specific board fundraising best practices (i.e. making a meaningful annual gift, making your organization one of their top three philanthropic priorities).
The insights of Simone Joyaux, ACFRE, author and renowned development professional, have been especially helpful to me in thinking about how organizations can use self-assessment to engage board members with fundraising in a focused, purposeful way. In the third edition of her book Strategic Fund Development, Joyaux reinforces that board members as a collective entity are responsible for governing the organization, and thus, ought to collectively establish their own performance expectations for fund development efforts. Because fundraising activities are essentially operational and not a governance function, it is the role of development staff to help translate board fundraising performance expectations and goals into tasks that can be performed by individual board members, and then support individual board members in carrying out those tasks. Starting with a board self-assessment can both assist board members in establishing shared fundraising performance expectations, and also help staff determine which board members are comfortable or willing to do certain types of fundraising activities, and whether or not skills-based training might be beneficial.
So, if you are a board member or a development staff feeling unclear, bogged down or rudderless when it comes to board fundraising, it may be a good time for you to make the case for a board self-assessment. Regardless of your current state, the process of self-assessment will provide an important opportunity for reflection that can help staff and board members refocus and re-engage.
Have you already completed the self-assessment process and need to analyze the results or create board training/skill-building opportunities?
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